Key Concepts & Self-Assessment15 Key Facts
Review key Indus Valley Town Planning: Grid Systems, Great Bath, Seals & Craft Production exam facts and rate your mastery to track revision.
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#1
Urban settlements featured an orthogonal gridiron layout dividing cities into fortified Citadels and residential Lower Towns.
#2
Standardized fired bricks with a 1:2:4 dimensional ratio and covered underground brick drainage networks were universal across major sites.
#3
The Great Bath at Mohenjo-daro utilized gypsum mortar and natural bitumen waterproofing for ritual bathing practices.
#4
Lothal featured an engineered tidal brick dockyard for maritime commerce with Mesopotamian ports known as Meluhha.
#5
Craft production specialized in steatite seals, lost-wax bronze casting (Dancing Girl), and carnelian bead manufacture at Chanhudaro.
#6
Dholavira in the Rann of Kutch featured a unique tripartite city layout (Citadel, Middle Town, Lower Town) and sixteen interconnected stone-cut water reservoirs.
#7
Kalibangan in Rajasthan yielded evidence of the earliest furrowed agricultural field dating to the pre-Harappan phase, along with fire altars.
#8
The Pashupati seal discovered at Mohenjo-daro depicts a seated horned figure surrounded by four animals: an elephant, a tiger, a rhinoceros, and a water buffalo.
#9
Harappan weight measurement followed a standardized binary system in lower denominations (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64) and a decimal system in higher denominations.
#10
Chanhudaro was the only Indus Valley settlement without a fortified citadel, functioning as an exclusive manufacturing centre for beads, seals, and shell ornaments.
#11
Rakhigarhi in Haryana, excavated by Amarendra Nath and Vasant Shinde, spans over 350 hectares, establishing it as the largest known Harappan archaeological site.
#12
Harappans procured copper from the Khetri mines of Rajasthan and Oman (Magan), lapis lazuli from Shortugai in Badakhshan, and tin from Afghanistan and Iran.
#13
A ten-character inscription consisting of large signboard symbols made of crystalline gypsum was unearthed in the northern gateway of Dholavira.
#14
The Dancing Girl figurine found at Mohenjo-daro measures 10.5 cm in height and was sculpted in bronze using the cire perdue (lost-wax) casting method.
#15
The granary complex at Harappa comprised two parallel rows of six granaries each, raised on brick platforms with air ducts to prevent moisture damage.
Subject Specialist Commentary
Analytical perspective & practical exam advice from the Master10 academic board
Imagine walking through an ancient city built four thousand years ago with paved, straight streets intersecting at right angles, covered underground brick drains, and sturdy houses made of standardized baked bricks. That was the Indus Valley Civilization. Cities were divided into an upper Citadel for public buildings and a Lower Town for daily living. From the waterproofed Great Bath at Mohenjo-daro to maritime dockyards at Lothal, their engineering focused on practical community living.
For SSC and UPSC prelims, examiners frequently test site-specific archaeological finds. Watch out for statement traps swapping city features: Dholavira is unique for its three-part division and stone water reservoirs, while Chanhudaro was an unfortified bead-making factory without any citadel. When preparing for MCQs, link Lothal to the tidal dockyard, Kalibangan to ploughed fields and fire altars, and Mohenjo-daro to the famous bronze Dancing Girl made using lost-wax casting.
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